Corpus-Paul

["moon-ryul jung" <moon AT saint.soongsil.ac.kr>]

Loren,
it is great for us to have some progress over discussion.

But there seems to be a huge gap between us. Because I know the problems
of
my position, I would like to continue this discussion with hope that 
I may find a position that solves those problems. To communicate better,
let me repeat my presupposition or hypothesis for reading the letter.

> Paul's language of "not from the
> works of the Law but faith" was employed to fight for the inclusion of
> Gentiles into the people of God by faith in Christ, WITHOUT them becoming
> Jews by doing the works of the Laws, the identity markers of the Jewish
> people.
> I believe that everytime Paul talks about the Law (negatively), he has
> in mind the issue of inclusion of the Gentiles. 
> 

Again, it seems that the clearest evidence for this hypothesis is
Rom 3:28-30:

We hold that man is righteoused by faith APART FROM WORKS OF LAW.
Or Is GOD the GOD of JEWS ONLY? Is he not the GOD OF GENTILES
ALSO? Yes of Gentiles also if indeed God is one, who will righteouses the
CIRCUMCISED on the ground of FAITH and the UNCIRCUMCISED through FAITH.

These three verses seem to clearly indicate that the issue in question is
the WORKS OF LAW has to do with the distinction between Jews and Gentiles,
and BY FAITH APART FROM WORKS OF LAW means BY THE COMMON GROUND, 
that is, FAITH which applies to both Jews and Gentiles. 

Rom 4 is a clear exposition of this thesis. So, the WORKS OF LAW are the
things of Jews, which makes the Jews Jews. As indicated by Rom 3:20-21,
APART FROM LAW and APART FROM WORKS OF LAW refer to the same thing. Doing
the LAW is doing the WORKS OF LAW, that is, doing the DEEDS COMMANDED
BY THE LAW.

Having stated my hypothesis, let me give my comments over your post.

According to your new interpretation, all things remain to be the same as
before except that THOSE UNDER THE LAW refers to the Jews, who needed
redemption (Gal 4:4-5):

    But when the time had fully come, God sent forth his Son, born of
woman, born under the law, 4:5 to redeem those [JEWS] who were under the
law, so that we [Gentiles] might receive adoption as sons.

But this change is critical in that redemption of THOSE UNDER THE LAW
gives
some ground for the adoption of Gentiles as sons of God. I accept this
reading;
I am convinced by your argument that Paul as the leader of a Gentile
church could identify with his flock by using "we" when the actual
referent was "you", the Gentile believers.

I came to the conclusion that this is actually the case in in 4:1 - 4:7 
by carefully examining the context of the paragraph. 
 
At the last verse 3:29 of chapter 3, Paul concludes: 
 And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, 
 heirs according to promise. 
In 4:1-7 Paul says something about the HEIR: the heir is treated
like a slave until mature. Paul concludes the paragraph by saying 
in 4:7:
  So through God you are no longer a slave but a son,  
  and if a son then an heir. 

This conclusion is essentially the same as 3:29. The paragraph 4:1- 4-6
is a digression that explains what the heir is when he is immature, that
is
why they Gentiles were subject to the stoicheia of the world as Gentiles 
even though they were heirs of God. I thought that the paragraph talks
about
the Jews, because they were considered sons/heirs of God, not Gentiles. 
Gentiles did not know God and were not known by God. But Paul somehow
thought
that they [Gentiles believers] were heirs of God as evidenced by their
faith
in Christ. But it promopted an explanation for their poor former state.
Hence
the "heir is like a slave until the full age reaches" explanation. 
It is reasonable to interpret "we" to refer to Gentile believers in "
So with us; when we were minors, we were slaves to the stoicheia of the
world".

This interpretation has a great merit in that the paragraph 4:1-7
naturally
flows into the following paragraph 4:8-11. For example, we can take
"enslaved to the stoicheia of the world" in the first paragraph and and
"enslaved to the poor and weak stoicheia" to refer to the same thing.
It was quite difficult to make Paul argue that "under the Law" is
the same thing as "under the stoicheia of the world". 

The greatest obstacle to taking "we" in 3:23-29 was the basic fact 
that Gentiles were not "UNDER THE LAW", they were not Law-people.
Apart from the context, "UNDER THE LAW", as an grammatical construction,
may refer to "under some moral principles". But Paul seems to use
that expression specifically to refer to the Jews, the people of the Law.
He talks about a historical situation, not timeless truth. For Paul
"under the law" means "the regime under the Law". It was a concrete
collection of laws that defined the Jews. 

Somehow, however, there seems to be a way that takes "we" to refer to
Gentiles but does not put them "under the law". Let me try it here. It
involves my
own free translation of the texts. 

   
The paragraph of 4:1-4:7 is a continuation of the section that starts at
3:19 "Why then the Law?"  Paul continues with the following paragraph:

3:22 But the scripture consigned all things to sin, that what was promised
to faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe. 3:23   Now
before faith came, we were guarded UNDER THE REGIME OF THE LAW, kept under
restraint until faith should be revealed. 3:24 So that the law was our
custodian until Christ came, that we might be justified by faith. 3:25 But
now that faith has come, we are no longer under a custodian; 3:26 for in
Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.
    
Now, "THOSE WHO BELIEVE" in 3:22 is naturally connected to "WE" in 3:23.
Then in what sense were those Gentile believers referred to by "we" 
confined by the Law of Jews UNTIL THE FAITH THAT WAS ABOUT TO BE REVEALED
(EIS THN MELLOUSAN PISTIN APOKALUFQHNAI)?

Gal 3:22-23 reminds me of Rom 3:21:
 But now the righteousness of God has been REVEALED APART FROM LAW,
 being witnessed by the Law and Prophets, 
 3:22 the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for
 ALL [that is, both Jews that had the LAW and Gentiles who didnt]
 who  believe. For there is no distinction. 

BY FAITH APART FROM LAW is a new thing made possible by Christ. Before
Christ, the Gentiles were guarded under the regime of the Law of 
Moses, although they were not directly under that regime. 
Even though they were not under the regime of the Law, they had to comply
with it in order to do some business with the Jews. 
It was like you have to become a citizen of the united states of America
by the law of the country to enjoy living in the country fully,
even though you were not under the regime of the country.

So, the Gentiles were guarded under the regime of the Law in the sense
that
they were required to become the people of the Law by getting circumcised
and (by doing other deeds commanded by the Law, WORKS OF LAW) to be
included into the people of God, that is, to get the status of being
righteoused.
In the old age, seemed that God was the God of Jews only: Gentiles should
become Jews in order to be included into the righteous, the people of God.
But the scripture itself beared witness to the age to come when this
constraint would go away. In Christ, the righteousness by FAITH APART
FROM LAW, apart from the requirement of being Jews, has been finally
 revealed. Gentiles were treated unfavorably by the Law of the Jews.
 Paul could say that the Law was the "pedagogue" of the Gentiles
that constrained the freedom of the Gentiles, with respect 
to being included into the people of God. At last that freedom was
 obtained through Christ, which Paul urged the Galatians to defend. 

However, this interpretation depends on whether I can 
hUPO NOMON EFROUROUMEQA to mean "were have been guarded-against under
the regime of the Law". It seems that the expression naturally means
 "God has put us under the guard of the Law" "God has guarded us
[from external danger] under the regime of the Law". 
I am not able to demonstrate that the expression can mean 
"God has guarded-against us [Gentiles] [for Jews] under the regime 
of the Law". So, I would like some others to refute or confirm it. 

Another paragraph we have to deal with is Gal 3:13-14.
  
 3:13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse
 for us -- for it is written, "Cursed be every one who hangs on a tree"
 --3:14 that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come upon THE
 GENTILES, that WE might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.
 
The logical sequence of Gal 3:14-14 is in three steps:

1) Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law,
2) The blessing of Abraham comes upon the Gentiles in Christ,
3) We receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

Here, step 1) is a ground of step 2), which is a ground of step 3.
The three steps seem to imply the following:
In order for the blessing of Abraham, the promise made to Abraham, to be
fulfilled, the Jews should be first redeemed. This reasoning also appears
in Gal 4:4-5, as you noted as well:

 God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, 4:5 to redeem
tho ones, Jews,  who were under the law, so that we, Gentiles, might
receive
adoption as sons. Hence it is natural to take "we" in 3:13 to refer to the
Jews. Otherwise, the logical sequence from step 1 to step 2 seems to be
broken; then we would have to interpret so that statement 1 and 
statement 2 refer to the same thing. Why would Paul have repeated himself?
The problem of my interpretation is that the "us" in 3:13 refers to the
Jews,
while the "we" in 3:14 refers to the Gentiles. Perhaps, in the same way
Paul naturally identified with Gentile believers, he would have
naturally identified with Jews. So, he used "we" to refer to the different
groups in a single sentence? In an aural speech, he might have used some
guesture to distinguish the referents of "us" and "we"?  But following 
Nark Nanos - it was discussed in the list- I would take "we" in 3:14 to 
mean "we all, both Jews and Gentiles", which is the motto of Paul
throughout the letter and in his mission.

We can discuss later what  "redeemed us Jews  
from the curse of the law" would mean. It seems that it would be
very difficult for you to accept this interpretation.
But even before attempting any interpretation, I propose that
"us" in this statement naturally refers to the Jews
from the viewpoint of logical reasoning in
3:13-14. 


 Moon

  
 Moon-Ryul Jung
 Dept of Media Technology
 Sogang Univ, Seoul, Korea